There are many cases where a telephone call suddenly rings or someone suddenly comes while the user is enjoying a television broadcasting, so that he overlooks a broadcasting program. If the user overlooked a television broadcasting program, this program can never be seen except for a program that is rebroadcasted. It is a rare case that the program is rebroadcasted in a short period of time. A news program and a sports program are not rebroadcasted in most cases. In many cases, therefore, if the user overlooked a television broadcasting program, this program cannot be seen forever.
There is a case where a scene such as good scene of a movie or a drama, interview of an important person, highlight scene of a sports program, or the like which the user wants to preserve suddenly starts during the watching of a broadcasting program. In such a case, a situation such that even if the user immediately sets a VTR, he misses such a scene and he cannot record the scene often occurs.
Therefore, a television receiver such that while the user is watching a broadcasting program, such a program is always recorded on a recording medium is considered. In such a television receiver, even if there is a sudden telephone call or someone suddenly comes, such a program can be traced back and reproduced and he does not overlook the program. Such a program can be easily preserved and even if a program which the user wants to record suddenly starts, it is possible to cope with it.
As a recording medium in the television receiver such that a program is always recorded onto a recording medium as mentioned above, a hard disk drive can be used. Hitherto, as a recording medium for recording a video signal, a magnetic tape is widely used. However, an accessing speed of the magnetic tape is slow and it is difficult to use it as a recording medium that is used in such a television receiver. Although the use of a semiconductor memory is considered, the semiconductor memory of a large capacity is very expensive. In the semiconductor memory, if a power source is turned off, the preserved program is erased, so that it is inconvenient in case of preserving a program for a long time. On the other hand, in the hard disk drive, a capacity is large and an accessing speed is also high enough.
As mentioned above, in the television receiver having the hard disk drive, the program which is being received is always recorded and this program can be easily preserved. In such a television receiver having the hard disk drive, it is further demanded that a desired program can be easily and certainly recorded from the start to the end.
That is, hitherto, as a recording apparatus of a video signal, a VTR for recording the video signal to a tape has been widespread. In the VTR, when a record key is pressed during the reception of the program, the program which is being received is recorded as it is. Therefore, in a case such that a desired program is preserved by the VTR, the record key has to be pressed at the start of the program and a stop key has to be pressed at the end of the program. However, unless attention is paid, the start time of the program is missed and the program cannot be recorded from the start thereof. As mentioned above, in the conventional VTR, when a desired program has started, it is difficult to record the desired program in a range from the start of the program to the end.
Although the timer reserving function is provided for the VTR, the operation for the timer reservation is complicated and the operation to set the recording start time and the recording end time is very troublesome.